ALISA VITTI: Welcome everyone.
My name's Alisa Vitti.
I'm the author of "WomanCode." And I'm really, really excited
to be here.
I'm in the midst of my whirlwind book tour.
I just got back from London.
And I'm just excited about sharing "WomanCode" with women
everywhere.
So I'm thrilled to be here at Google, bringing
"WomanCode" to Google.
Very exciting.
For me, I never really considered how important
hormones were and how hormones affect everything until my
hormones stopped working properly.
So I want your picture me as I was a number of years back.
I was over 200 pounds.
I was covered face, chest, and back, in extreme cystic acne.
I was exhausted.
I couldn't wake up in the morning.
I couldn't go to sleep at night.
It was a whole nightmare.
And I wasn't getting my period, maybe
once or twice a year.
I was also at Johns Hopkins on my way to becoming an OB/GYN
when all of the hormonal stuff hit the fan.
And it was in that moment, where I was faced with this
whole future of obesity, diabetes, infertility, heart
disease, cancer, that I realized that there was a
different path.
And in that moment with my doctor, once we finally--
I was one night at the medical library and researching a
little bit on what might I have, because I had gone six
years without a diagnosis.
And I finally figured out what it was that I had, which is a
condition called polycystic ovarian syndrome.
How many of you know someone with that disorder?
It's 1 out of 4 or 5 women have that disease.
And it's a miscommunication between the hypothalamus and
the pituitary gland and the ovary.
And so you don't end up ovulating or menstruating.
So I asked her, now what, now, that we know what we do, after
we had our doctor's visit?
And she said, there's really nothing that we can do.
But we can medicate you along the way for all of those
problems that you'll be having.
And I was a young woman.
And I thought to myself, do I want to be on medication for
the rest of my life for heart disease and high blood
pressure and diabetes and infertility?
The medication roller coaster seemed endless.
And that's when I decided to throw myself into functional
medicine, because I had been privy to some really cool
research at Hopkins about nutritional genomics and
epigenetics.
Do you guys remember the Human Genome Project?
And what came out of that was a surprising discovery, that
there's this little ghost protein that
wraps around your genes.
And there are only two factors that influence its
construction or expansion, which then causes genes to
express disease or health.
And it's food and lifestyle.
So, of course, it was very exciting to think about if we
can manipulate gene expression on that microscopic level with
food and lifestyle, what could we do with food on a systemic
standpoint in the endocrine system?
And so I began putting my protocol together.
And I love especially sharing about the skin.
Because so many people with cystic acne, they end up
taking things like Accutane and all of these things.
And I have not done any of that.
And to have 60 pounds come off of my body, to have my skin
clear up, to be able to be having a period and ovulating
normally for over 12 years now, it's really remarkable.
Because every time I go to the gynecologist still, they're
like, do you really not have PCOS anymore?
And they do all the blood tests.
They check everything out.
They're like. wow, we just have never thought that that
was possible.
So it's exciting that not only do I share this work with
other women but also, I know firsthand the power of using
food sequencing, which is the crux of my protocol in terms
of correcting hormonal issues.
And this is why it's so important.
Right now, unlike any other time we've seen before in
women's health, we are dealing with issues
at an epidemic rate.
Now, this number of 20 million women suffering from menstrual
disorders, fertility issues, libido issues, energy issues,
it's a low number.
In fact, when I talk to my colleagues, they're always
encouraging me to double or maybe triple the number.
But safe to say, that half of the women who are struggling
are not talking about it.
So it's easily upwards of 40 million women.
In 2009, we had almost $2 billion being spent on
assisted reproductive technologies, like IVF.
How many of you know friends who are doing the IVF roller
coaster and its multiple rounds and it's failing?
And it's distressing, right?
And now there's some concern about what are the long term
repercussions of so much synthetic hormone stimulation
during the IVF process on your overall health and well being.
So we're not having the results that our bodies are
capable of.
We're designed to have healthy periods.
We're designed to make babies if we want to.
In fact, we're designed to have a hotter sex drive as we
age, unlike men who peter off, pun intended.
So we are supposed to be fantastic all of our lives.
And there is just this flood of issues.
And I think what's exciting for me, because I've been
doing this for a long time.
I've had a center in the city for over 10 years.
What's exciting is now that it's more prominent in the
media, I love talking about the Kardashian sisters,
because we have been with them from their period problems to
their pregnancy problems to their postpartum problems.
And it really puts a nice lens on what so many women are
dealing with.
And everyone can identify with one of the issues that these
women are going through.
So it brings up something that's really, really
interesting.
So in 2009, the National Institute of Health published
a very important body of research.
And I wish I had t-shirts that I could wear that said, I've
read the bio cycle study, on the front, and on
the back, have you?
Because this is something that's ground breaking
research for all women.
And this bio cycle study basically with let us know
that if you have any sort of menstrual disturbance in your
20s or 30s, something as simple as PMS, something
that's the butt of our jokes.
Like, I'm just that way half the month.
And it's just normal.
How many of us anticipate that that's the case?
Yeah?
In fact, it can end up leading to the big four disease of
inflammation in your post menopausal years.
So something as harmless as we jokingly think about PMS can
end up increasing our likelihood for diabetes, heart
disease, cancer, and Alzheimer's.
So to me, that is something that I would want us to pay a
lot of attention to.
Because the great news is you can completely change and
affect how your body's performing from a hormonal
standpoint by using food.
So like I was saying, hormones affect everything.
How many of you connect the dots back to your hormones
when you have a flare up of acne or constipation or
sleeplessness or your mood is changing or the way you're
thinking about a project is changing?
Maybe you've tied that back to your hormones.
This is good.
I'm going to give you even more granular
level thinking on that.
The problem that we have in the way that these issues are
being approached is that the western medical model has us
treating symptoms.
And really, you should think of that as spot treating.
You have a headache, you take an Advil.
You have cramps, you take--
What do you guys take for cramps?
Midol, Advil, whatever you're taking.
You have acne.
You buy potions and lotions.
Maybe you try some internal medicine.
And how many of you spend at least $100 on supplements a
month, just trying things out?
OK.
All right.
How many of you are trying supplements at all?
Yeah.
So we're always trying to spot treat what is going on with
our hormones.
And really, when I dove into the research that led me to
the protocol that I designed, what I found from a functional
medicine standpoint was that we actually have to treat the
root causes.
If we're going to allow the body to heal itself and
resolve its issues on its own, which is exactly what the
endocrine system is designed to do, we have to address the
root causes.
And I want to go over that with you today.
What are the functions of the endocrine system?
How do you interact with it with food?
So that whatever troubles you're having, from PMS to
infertility to wanting to preserve your fertility for
the next few years until you meet your partner, the partner
of your dreams or what have you.
I met mine at Google.
Isn't that funny?
AUDIENCE: Are you serious?
ALISA VITTI: He's an ex-Googler.
So you want to be prepared for that, hormonally speaking.
And so we can do that using food.
What's really cool, and since I'm at one of the coolest tech
companies here, I just wanted to brag a little bit about my
tech company.
So I have been in clinical practice, as I mentioned, for
over 10 years.
And about a year and a half ago, I had a really exciting
conversation with a couple of people.
And I shared with them this big vision that I had, that
women's hormonal health needs to be as prominent as
something like Weight Watchers, for example.
We need to have a tool.
We need to have a system.
So I went ahead and built the world's first online hormone
improvement platforms.
So think of it like Rosetta Stone for your ovaries.
You can log in and do the protocol.
Because I was having women calling in from the UK, from
Australia, from South America, from Europe and we needed a
way to serve all of them.
So it's really cool.
In the past two years, we've seen so many women logging on
to the system from six continents, really getting the
results that they want and all through using the protocol.
So women who've had--
Emily, for example, this one of our clients.
She was having two periods a month.
Think about going on acting calls and having
two periods a month.
That's a lot.
That's intense.
And to be able to resolve that permanently with
changing her diet.
Or Lisa, who is someone who I just adore.
Her first pregnancy was through multiple rounds of
IVF, after which she was suffering from severe
postpartum depression, weight gain, and her underlying
hormonal issues magnified.
And she prepared her body for the next conception using the
"WomanCode" protocol and was able to get pregnant the first
time without IVF, no postpartum depression.
The child actually has a stronger immune system.
And her pregnancy was much easier the second time around.
So all food, all food.
Oh yeah, I do have to brag one more little thing about the
"Dr. Oz" show.
How many of you saw the clip that I did
on "Dr. Oz?" Anyone?
Well, we will make it available to you.
I made a little TV history, actually recently.
This is all around the book launch.
And what I did on the "Dr. Oz" show was I wanted to share
with his audience, with women everywhere--
You know how he did the famous look before you
flush for your poop?
Remember that?
Remember?
I know.
I'm going to say lots of bodily functions today.
Just bear with me.
I know it's lunch, but we got to go with it.
I just thought, well, one of the best ways for a woman to
gauge how she's doing hormonally month over month is
to actually take a look at her menses before she flushes.
Because the color and texture of that will actually tell you
what's going on with your estrogen, what's going on with
your progesterone.
And I will admit, you ladies are faring much better than
the Londoners.
When I brought this up to the London crew, they were like--
[GASPS]
ALISA VITTI: Oh my god.
She's talking about menstrual blood.
That's horrible.
But it's so important to know what the different colors and
textures are.
There are four key ones.
And I would love for you all to go and check that
clip out and know.
And spread the word to your friends, because not only in
the short term does it have health implications, like for
example, if you have low estrogen and your period looks
a little light and thin, like strawberry jam.
Thinly spread strawberry jam is how we simulated these
things on TV.
I used fruit juices on little white dishes.
It was very cool.
We joke about that.
Like, oh, my period's so light and lucky me.
But actually, you're now putting your bone density at
risk, because estrogen protects bone density.
That's in the short term.
In the long term, it has other repercussions about the way
that your ovaries age, the way that your body ages, and your
long term fertility.
So looking and checking month over month.
And that's just one of the four.
See now, aren't you curious to know the other three?
I'm not going to tell you.
So the book just came out.
It's really exciting.
And I want to walk you through it as a way of introducing you
to the protocol and how your body works.
So let's start with the first part.
The first part has to do with unlocking your woman code.
Because there's this thing, if there was a code inside of
your body that would give you access to feeling good all
month, you'd want to crack the code, yeah?
How many of you are computer programmers in here?
Any hackers?
Ah, so hot.
Yes.
So I'm a biohacker.
I'm a hormone hacker.
That's what I do.
And I've figured out how to do this.
I want teach you how to hack.
So here's the problem.
The problem with accessing the code is that we're blocked in
a lot of ways.
And one of the first things that you have to do in
establishing an environment inside of your body where your
endocrine system can thrive is that you need to remove what I
call flow blockers, pun intended.
We want to restore flow, not just your menstrual flow, but
also your whole hormonal cascade.
As I like to say, head to ovaries.
So the first problem is, how many of you, if I asked you to
get up on the whiteboard right now and draw me a 28 to 30 day
monthly cycle with all five hormonal patterns, could do
that for me?
AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE].
ALISA VITTI: Uh huh.
And?
And she doesn't know what the fifth one is.
I know.
And don't worry.
It's kind of a loaded question.
I teach doctors all the time, surgeons.
And they can't do it either, which says a lot.
So we don't know what's going on.
And that's just on the level of the period.
But we also don't know what the parts are, what they're
doing, how your thyroid's affected by, how much sodium
you're consuming during it.
We just don't know.
So that's part of the issue.
The other issue, as I mentioned earlier, is this
paradigm in health care to spot treat symptoms is
incorrect for systemic health issues.
If it were just as simple as your wrist was broken and they
put a cast on it, then that would be great.
You can spot treat that issue.
But because we're talking about all of these different
glands and all these different hormones, we need a whole
system approach to get it right.
And then the third thing--
And this is really where you can get activated.
One of the chapters of the book really goes into, so you
have a manual for this.--
Is removing endocrine disruptors.
One of the reasons why we are seeing women at epidemic rates
experience suffering around these issues in their health
is because we are living in an environment that is flooding
our bodies with something called xenoestrogens, which is
just a fancy pants term for synthetic estrogens, strange,
external estrogen.
And it adheres to our own estrogen receptor sites.
And it starts to cause confusion in the hormonal
conversation that our body's trying to have and can make
you estrogen dominant, which then causes all sorts of
problems around your cycle and your fertility.
So what can we do?
First things first, you have to choose
organic 80% of the time.
Notice, I'm not saying 100% of the time.
I'm just saying 80%.
Especially, when it comes to fruits,
vegetables, and animal products.
These are just the biggest offenders in terms of
endocrine disruption that you could expose your body to.
And if you are trying to lose weight, clear up your skin,
preserve your fertility for the long term, fix PMS, get
rid of the annoying--
Just doing this alone will make dramatic inroads into
that progress.
And then the second thing that you need to do is--
And I give a giant list in the book.
You have to look at the lotions and potions you're
putting on your skin.
Your skin is your largest organ.
It's also the largest organ of elimination.
Anything that you put on your skin, you better be willing to
take a tablespoon of it and eat it.
That's always my litmus test.
Would I, if under duress, eat this body lotion?
I know that sounds silly.
And I don't actually eat my body lotion.
But if I needed to, I would feel comfortable doing it
because it has three or four ingredients in it, like olive
oil, Shea butter, vitamin E. If you have something from,
I'm not going to name names, fancy lingerie stores that
smell really perfumy and all of that, and you're putting it
on your skin, there are so many chemicals in that lotion
that are FDA known endocrine disruptors that are ending up
in your bloodstream and messing with that delicate
chemical conversation of your hormones.
Really, really essential you do an audit.
Just audit your medicine cabinet, your bathroom
products, from your shampoo to your make up to your lotion,
and see if there's a way for you to start slowly.
Finish up what you've got.
Does not need to be extreme.
Finish up what you've got and start to
slowly make some changes.
Let me assure you, 15 years ago, Whole Foods did not have
the wide array that it does today of fun products
that you can try.
But now, there are so many fabulous skin care lines and
makeup lines and body care lines that you can experience.
And you should.
You should give us a try.
I'm going to save questions for the end.
Is that OK?
But write them down, because I'm totally into it.
So what I want for you, I want you to get into a state of
hormonal flow, where you are in sync with your hormones
every day, where you know how to manage your endocrine
balance on a regular basis.
So let's go into the protocol and share with
you how that works.
And this is the second part of my book and
accessing your code.
So the first piece of the sequencing protocol, and I'm
just going to load them all up for you, is blood sugar
stabilization.
And I'm going to go through each one and share with you
some of the fun science behind how this all works.
Because I think science is really hot.
And the more I know about my body, the better I'm able to
work with it.
And I feel like all of you smart Google ladies are into
data and science.
Yes?
Not afraid?
Good.
So that's the first thing.
And it's so important because of the nature of which the
endocrine system prefers to operate.
And stabilization of blood sugar is the first place you
have to go.
If you go anywhere else--
And this is one of the things that I talk a lot
about in the book.
How many of you detox, have done a cleanse, have done some
sort of juice madness?
That's great.
I'm drinking a green juice, but I'm not on a cleanse.
I just like to alkalinize my blood system.
It's so important to appreciate that just doing a
detox doesn't actually get your endocrine
system to work better.
It actually can make you feel worse.
And it's because it's out of order.
So second piece, all of you mentioned
that you were exhausted.
And this is a state of adrenal fatigue.
I'm going to show you what's happening with your adrenal
gland in a moment, of why that's happening to you and
what you can do to restore it.
One of the reasons why detoxing, first, is a problem
for women who are dealing with these issues is they are
typically all adrenally fatigued.
You all have some experience of
inappropriate cortisol levels.
When you start doing cleanses, extreme cleanses--
Like the worst offender, I think, is the master cleanse,
because you're living on lemon juice and cayenne pepper.
It's insane.
And you're not really eating.
You're further taxing adrenal function, making all of the
problems more compounded.
Even though it might be trendy and Gwyneth Paltrow's doing
it, and I love her, I just don't want you to do it first.
Because then in the third step of the protocol, in the food
sequencing piece, we then do focus in on metabolizing
toxins and eliminating excess estrogen.
And we do that in a very safe food based way that doesn't
cause you to feel any worse.
And the last piece, which is my most exciting piece,
especially when it comes to the world of work, is the
hormonal synchronization piece.
How do you live in cyclical harmony with the four distinct
hormonal shifts that you experience in a 30 day period?
Because they are changing the way you think, the way your
body wants to exercise, the kind of sex you want to be
having, how much sleep you need, what kinds of things
you're naturally going to want to prioritize at work.
They're affecting all of that.
And knowing how to lean into that makes you healthier in
the short term, and also more successful in your
life in the long term.
And I'm 10 years into living this life style.
So I can assure you, just last year, launching this platform,
writing a book, planning my wedding, getting married, and
looking and feeling great, all of that is possible because I
live in this constant state of forward vector motion.
What's really cool about your cycle is that it's own form of
natural biotechnology.
And we'll learn more about that as we go.
But let me introduce you to one of my favorite people,
your endocrine system.
I have such a great relationship with her.
She is extraordinary.
And I want you to get to know her a little bit.
And this is just a very basic rendering of how she operates.
And we're just going to go through the parts.
You have in your midbrain, hypothalamus
and pituitary gland.
Think of them like the person who listens to the voice mail
and then the switchboard operator.
Hypothalamus is listening, scanning your bloodstream,
negative biofeedback, really seeing what's the hormonal
status quo right now in real time, all the time.
And the pituitary gland is sending out messages to all
the other target glands of the endocrine system.
Oh, we need more thyroid hormone.
Oh, we need more adrenaline or cortisol.
Oh, we need more of this or that.
And that's your switchboard operator.
Then you have your thyroid.
Then you have the adrenals, the ovaries, the pancreas.
I include some other things in here because, from a
functional medicine standpoint, we also want to
consider how the body is detoxifying.
So I include things like the liver and the kidneys and the
heart, as well.
Because it's all about keeping things moving.
So let's talk a little bit about the first step of the
protocol and how your blood sugar is operating.
So how many of you woke up this morning and
had a cup of coffee?
And how many of you had that cup of coffee with nothing
else, just for the first hour and a half?
OK.
And how many of you had the cup of coffee with something
like a carb, like, I don't know, not a pop tart, but
something like that.
Like toast or banana.
AUDIENCE: Does fruit count?
ALISA VITTI: Yeah.
Fruit's got sugar, yup.
So basically, what ends up happening to you is you wake
up in a state of hypoglycemia.
So let's just define the terms.
There's hyperglycemia, too much sugar in the blood.
Hypoglycemia, not enough sugar in the blood.
You wake up in a state of hypoglycemia because you've
slept for eight hours, hopefully.
And you haven't eaten, unless you're hooked up to an IV
feeding tube, which you're not.
And so your blood sugar is low when you wake up.
So if you put something that has too much sugar in your
bloodstream in the morning, your blood
sugar's going to spike.
And caffeine, and I ask about the caffeine issue because
it's the one thing that you do that changes your blood sugar
destiny the rest of the day.
If you do caffeine, here's what caffeine does.
It indirectly has more sugar secreted into the bloodstream.
Caffeine stimulates cortisol.
Cortisol, we'll learn in a moment, talks to your fat
cells and has those fat cells convert into glucose.
So indirectly, it gets your blood sugar levels up.
It also stimulates adrenaline.
It actually prevents your body from breaking adrenaline down,
is what caffeine does.
So you feel the effects of it longer.
And that's why you feel energized from coffee.
And I put major quotations around that, because it's not
real energy.
It's just adrenaline that you can't get rid of.
So now you're blood sugar's up.
And no matter what you do the rest of the day, if you've
done the caffeine the first thing in the morning like
that, you will not get off this roller coaster.
You will be chasing that first high all day long.
So you'll crash midmorning.
And you'll feel like whoever is having a birthday and the
cupcakes are around or whatever it is, you're going
to have more carbs than you would normally.
By lunch, you're going to be doing the same thing.
You're going to over indulge.
And you're going to be beating yourself up the whole time
thinking, where's my willpower?
I told myself I was going to be good today.
And there's no possible way.
The brain chemistry will override you every time,
because the first thing the endocrine system wants to
protect is not your period, ironically.
It's the sugar that's available to the brain, the
heart, and the muscle tissue.
If you do anything to mess with the sugar that's
available for your brain, your heart, and your muscle tissue,
you have no more say in the matter.
Ghrelin will be secreted.
All sorts of neurotransmitters will start to get in line to
make you crave sugar.
Because if you haven't put enough in, the brain is going
to freak out.
And then all of a sudden, it's going to try to bypass you.
Because clearly, you have no idea what you're doing,
according to the brain.
So that's a typical profile of what a lot of women are
experiencing.
And then even if you don't do caffeine in the morning, or
you do it with food, or you have, let's say, something
like half a bagel in the morning, or a muffin, or
something that seems reasonable, it's shooting up
your blood sugar level no matter what.
And then you're going to have insulin act on that.
It's going to drop your blood sugar levels.
It's going to go all over the place.
So you're finding yourself less and less able to stay
away from those afternoon cravings.
How many of you feel like at 3:30 or 4
o'clock, you feel awesome?
OK.
Crickets.
So I did a little experiment.
I'm a researcher.
And so I sat in a Starbucks for a couple of days.
And I sat there all day.
I was just working there.
And I just tracked the patterns.
And my thesis was that we would see spikes in traffic at
Starbucks during the times where people are
stereotypically hypoglycemic, which is midmorning and
midafternoon.
And let me tell you, the zombielike march into a
Starbucks at 3:30, from 3:30 to 4:30, it is insane.
Don't even go to try and buy coffee at that time.
You will wait for 25 minutes to get a cup of coffee.
And it's not just the coffee.
Also then, oh well, this little sweet thing only has
180 calories.
And that seems reasonable.
So you're having more sugar than you would normally
because your body is requesting it.
And so this is a big problem.
Also, any of you ever driving in a car and see
someone with road rage?
Road rage is hypoglycemia.
That's all.
If you see someone with road rage, or even on the subway,
give them a bar, like a Larabar.
Just fix them right away.
What we want to see is blood sugar that's hugging the
stasis line much more closely.
And you get there by modifying concentrations of
macronutrients during breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
And we help women figure out what do they need in each
meal, based on their body's response to carbohydrates,
proteins, fats, and extreme sugars.
So how much can you tolerate?
How much can you tolerate such that you're only undulating
around the line, versus spiking and
dipping around the line?
And for someone who used to struggle with weight as a
result of my hormonal issues, just clearing this up alone
takes care of any sort of stubborn weight issues that
you might be having.
So it's really, really exciting to know that you can
just eat your way.
Eat to be thin, which is really fun.
Because I like to eat.
Food is delicious.
If you don't get the blood sugar right, it starts to
throw off that chemical conversation
in a long term way.
So in the short term, we know that it affects the brain, the
heart, and the muscle tissue, and starts to have you secrete
all sorts of neurotransmitters that get you excited to eat
sugar and zap your will power.
Will power doesn't really exist in a neurochemical
standpoint.
So I don't really think to try to use that.
I would rather you leverage your hormones instead, because
they're much more powerful than your
thoughts in a lot of ways.
But over time, if you continue to have this blood sugar
roller coaster, it's going to affect your liver.
It's going to affect your pancreatic response.
It's going to affect your thyroid.
It's going to affect your adrenals.
And it's going to clog up the pathways of elimination.
And I'm going to share more about that now.
Of course, at the end of all of this, how is it causing you
to pay attention to it?
Because you may not notice these discrete symptoms of
your adrenals being off, or your thyroid being off, or
things of this nature.
Although, in the book, I teach you how to observe these
things in the body in real time.
But how you'll notice it over time is that all of a sudden,
your period will be funky.
You'll have a big heavy period.
Or you'll have clots.
Or you'll have major cramping.
Or you'll have PMS that just rocks you and takes you out of
your life for a day or two, which is not normal.
And by the time you get to observing a symptom like that,
do you appreciate, now, the mountain of chemical imbalance
that has been persisting for a period of time?
No hormonal symptom, from a menstrual standpoint, a
fertility standpoint, low energy, low sex drive, just
happens out of the blue.
Never.
Doesn't just happen to you.
It comes through improper management of the food that's
affecting these things that we're talking about in the
food sequencing that then causes an environment for all
of this to start to break down.
Make sense?
So let's look at the adrenals.
This is so much fun.
I love cross sections of glands.
OK.
I'm such a science nerd.
But you wear cute jewelry anyway.
It's fine.
So the adrenal gland, so powerful,
located in your mid back.
Do you all know where your adrenal glands are?
Now you do.
Over here.
Right here.
OK.
And they are nestled in with the kidneys,
really powerful gland.
In fact, the inner most part, the medulla, forms at the same
time in utero as the brain and the spinal cord.
It's a primitive extension of the brain, in fact.
The cortex, which is what we're going to talk about, the
three outermost zones, are essential for your life.
And unlike the brain, the adrenal gland does not adapt.
Not happening.
Doesn't adapt to stress.
Doesn't adapt to your diet.
It does not like it if you do things that make it unhappy.
And it will start to affect you in very profound ways.
Now, I'm not going to get into the zona glomerulosa,
fasciculata, all these wonderful Latin names that
won't make any sense to you.
But what I am going to tell you about is this relationship
between cortisol and DHEA.
So if you notice, the two innermost zones, the
blue and the pink.
The blue is the zone that produces cortisol.
The pink is the zone that produces DHEA.
When you have stress, let's say, you're on a deadline or
you're running late to an event or something like that,
you get a little boost of cortisol.
Why?
Why does this happen to us?
Well, cortisol has a special relationship with your butt.
How many of you have a special relationship with your butt?
Just your adrenal glands do.
So it talks to the fat cells that are stored in whatever
body part that tends to store your fat.
But for women, it's usually our hips, butt, and thighs.
That's typically where we tend to store fat.
And cortisol tells those fat cells,
hey, something's happening.
We don't know what it is, because it's
not the whole brain.
It's just a primitive part of
responding to external factors.
Can you please convert some of that fat to glucose?
Because what is fat?
Fat is just long term storage of sugar.
That's all that it is.
So cortisol reverses the process, get's it into the
bloodstream.
And all of a sudden, you have a little bit of extra energy
for the brain, the heart, and the muscle tissue to respond
to the external stress.
Makes sense?
Now, that's cool once in a blue moon.
That's cool if all of a sudden you have to catch the train.
And if you don't catch the train, you're going to miss
your plane.
And that's really great.
But it's not great if this is happening to you all day long.
And here's why.
It has a suppressive effect on DHEA.
The more cortisol that your adrenal gland secretes, the
less DHEA you will produce.
And DHEA is the mother hormone from which, for women, 90% of
your testosterone is manufactured.
So any of you who are feeling like you can't build up muscle
mass though you are working out, you still
feel soft and flabby.
You go to flex and nothing's there, but you've
been doing push ups.
Is that happening to people?
If you're all adrenally fatigued, it is
happening to you.
If you feel like you just don't have the same stamina
for running around and doing things in your life, this is
what's happening.
Cortisol up, DHEA levels down.
If your sex response and drive is kind of like, meh, this is
what's happening here.
And do you know what I mean by, meh?
So what should it look like?
On a normal, healthy person without any level of adrenal
fatigue, you get a nice surge of cortisol in the morning to
wake you up.
How is it that we stay asleep all night and then all of a
sudden, magically, in the morning, we wake up?
It is not the alarm clock people,
although that does help.
But if you want to do an experiment--
I don't use an alarm clock.
I just tell myself before I sleep what time I'd
like to wake up.
And then I just do.
Why?
That's a whole other fun conversation.
But my adrenal glands support the ability of my body to wake
up at the right time in the morning.
Because again, cortisol surging at this
time is doing what?
Talking to your long term sugar storage, aka your fat,
getting some of that to convert in to sugar to help
your brain, heart, muscle tissue go through metabolic
changes to feel like they can be awake.
That's what's happening in the morning.
And then you get another surge midday.
You get a little bit in the afternoon.
And it starts to taper off dramatically so that you can
wind down and go to sleep.
Now, how many of you feel like when you wake up, you kind of
feel a little hung over, like groggy, even though you have
not been drinking?
I know you're all not drinking every night.
But you wake up and you're like, oh god, help me.
This feeling, this is a normal feeling.
We're all laughing.
OK, here's what's happening.
You're having adrenal fatigue.
So instead of having that nice surge of cortisol helping you
wake up with joy and vigor in the morning, which is how you
should feel--
Remember when you were a kid, you were like, I'm up.
Somebody else wake up.
Oh my god.
That's how it should be every day still.
But that's not happening.
Instead, we get not enough cortisol
secreted in the morning.
We feel a little bit like we're dragging.
Even though we're doing caffeine, still we don't feel
the same surge of energy.
How many of you had the caffeine this morning and felt
like you were five and it was Christmas morning?
No, it is not giving you the return on your investment that
you would like it to.
And then, you maybe get a little bit
more around the midday.
But you start to get your big surge in the afternoon, late
afternoon, evening, even as late as 10 o'clock.
How many of you feel like you're night owls?
And you wake up truly after dinner.
And you're like gosh, I should just do all my work in the
middle of the night.
That's super cool.
I'm not someone who's a conformist.
I'm going to be in the middle of the night
doing all my work.
No.
This is just an indication that your adrenal glands are
not performing the way that they should.
There are four different degrees of adrenal fatigue.
This, I would say, is about stage two.
Stage three and stage four include other things like
major anxiety, response at inappropriate times, even
panic attacks for no appropriate reason.
That type of a thing can accompany heart palpitations,
sweating, it gets much, much worse.
And think about it.
We're talking about cortisol.
We're talking about adrenaline.
We're talking about DHEA.
We're talking about this gland that governs a lot of the
functions of your response.
And it's hard to pinpoint because it can be lumped in.
The symptoms can be lumped in with other things.
Because you'll feel generally tired.
So maybe you'll think it's a thyroid problem.
Or you'll have maybe reduced immunity.
And you think, oh it's just flu season.
But actually, when adrenal is underperforming, you are much
more likely to catch everybody's cold.
OK.
So there's all of this.
Poor digestion, improper elimination, all of this can
be affected by adrenal fatigue.
So it's really, really important that we
get the hang of it.
And depression and anxiety, such a big
problem for so many women.
We go through monthly bouts of this if we're hormonally
imbalanced.
But with adrenal fatigue on top of it, the issue is
compounded in multiples.
So if you're struggling with a feeling of not feeling
yourself or feeling anxiety or feeling continuous worrisome
thoughts, we should look at what's happening with your
adrenals and eat for adrenal happiness.
Third piece of the food sequencing protocol has to do
with your pathways of elimination.
And you have four of them.
And all them work in synergy to help you break down
hormonal toxins, especially estrogen.
Think about it this way.
Imagine if you were producing adrenaline in the morning.
And then you weren't able to break that down and get that
out of your body.
How would you feel?
You feel a little, all day.
You feel anxious.
And estrogen, this happens to so many women.
You're producing estrogen on a continuous basis.
That's your body's job.
Your ovaries are producing estrogen.
This is what it's supposed to be doing.
If you're not breaking that down, estrogen's one of those
hormones that's like a double edged sword.
Just the right amount makes you look and feel fantastic.
Too much or too little is very problematic in different ways.
So if you have too much estrogen that's not breaking
down, this can cause all sorts of problems in terms of your
hormonal health, from weight gain to fibrocystic breasts to
increased risk for cancer to PMS, endometriosis, fibroids,
ovarian cyst development, all of this.
Very serious stuff.
And what's interesting when we think about how they work
together is that--
And the reason why they're organized in this way is
because this is decreasing magnitude.
So the skin is your largest organ.
That's why it's so important that you make the choice not
to put things on your skin that are going to already--
You're already dealing with estrogen dominance because we
live in 2013.
And this is the state that the environment is polluted with
so much xenoestrogen that evidently fish, which develop
their gender outside of the mother's reproductive system,
are all turning into female fish in the rivers because a
lot of women are taking birth control pills.
That's ending up in our water supply.
And there's chemicals and pesticides.
It is happening.
So we are flooded with too much estrogen.
And so we just don't want to put any more on ourselves that
we don't have to.
The liver, I'm going to talk about in a moment, but has a
special relationship with your large intestine.
We're going to talk about poop for one more time?
OK, you're cool?
You're cool with poop?
I'm so cool with it.
Here's the thing.
How many of you feel like you go to the bathroom every day,
no problem?
Put your hands up.
Everybody keep your hands up until this no
longer applies to you.
How many of you wake up and go to the bathroom kind of
relatively before noon?
OK.
How many of you have that happen within 90 minutes of
opening your eyeballs, have a bowel movement?
90 minutes.
How many of you have that within 20 minutes?
Great, awesome.
That's where you should be.
You wake up--
Oh wait, one last check.
You have that 20 minutes, no caffeine.
Awesome.
OK good.
So how it should work is eyeballs open, glass of water,
brush your teeth, bowel movement.
20 minutes.
If that's not happening, you're struggling with a level
of constipation.
And why that's important is it's indicating now, if the
large intestine is the smallest place that we have
elimination of estrogen, can you imagine the backup that
it's going to cause in the liver, in the lymphatic
system, on the skin?
Constipation, for sure, will lead to skin problems.
And a lot of women are struggling with rosacea and
eczema and acne.
And all of this is a sign that the liver, the large
intestine, the lymph are overloaded with toxins and
that you need to change, not what you're putting on your
skin to spot treat the eczema, the rosacea.
We talked about this.
No more spot treating.
We want to start cleaning up liver,
large intestine function.
So let's look at the liver.
And I want to break down the pathways of
elimination for you.
This is super cool because this really shows the
importance of what you're eating.
Your liver has these two phases of detoxification.
The first phase, basically, breaks your hormones down into
fat soluble, more toxic forms of the hormone than it was
originally.
The second phase converts it into a water soluble, less
toxic form that can leave your body safely through the urine,
the sweat, the bowel movement.
So the skin, the lymphatic system, the large intestine
are going to be the transport systems
for this waste product.
What is required to be on tap in your liver, stored in your
liver at all times are key micronutrients to support in
phase one and phase two of this detoxification.
So these are things like B vitamins, vitamin C, selenium,
glutathione.
I want to focus in a little bit on selenium and
glutathione because they're kind of fun.
So how many of you remember the whole story of the sperm
and the egg and when they come together, it makes a
life, dah dah dah?
Do you know why that happens?
This is so cool.
This is a little off topic, but everybody needs to know.
It's selenium and glutathione.
It actually is such an important
chemical catalytic reaction.
Selenium is stored in the sperm in high concentration.
Glutathione in the egg in high concentration.
When they come together, it's the selenium and the
glutathione that react in a catalytic way that starts the
cell dividing.
Isn't that so amazing?
And it's because of what you were eating.
You cannot supplement as effectively the selenium and
glutathione versus other supplements.
We know vitamin C supplements are recognized by the body.
Glutathione, we haven't been able to manufacture a
synthetic form that's bioavailable.
You have to eat it.
And if it's not present in adequate supply for your liver
and you're noticing little breakouts, what's happening
with your egg quality?
So we're thinking about preserving our fertility for
the long term.
We have to be thinking about all the ways in which this is
interconnected?
Do you understand?
So how do we get glutathione?
How do we get selenium?
Selenium is easy.
Two to four Brazil nuts a day, you're set.
That's rich supply of selenium.
This is good for your partners, if they're men.
And they're working on sperm quality, motility, health,
whatever, great to have them be eating Brazil nuts.
Glutathione, lucky us, is found in any every organic,
raw fruit and vegetable.
It's in everything.
So if you were to have something like one green juice
a day at any point, doesn't have to be during a fast or
anything, or some steamed or raw veggies, or some good
quality fruits, you're going to be dosing yourself with
this essential micronutrient that not only is talking about
preserving egg quality, but also helping your
liver do its job.
Because if we don't have adequate supply.--
Remember, in phase one, it breaks the hormones down into
a more toxic form, that ends up circulating in your body if
it's not broken down properly.
And it can make your liver perform inappropriately and
have you store more sugar as fat in the liver and not break
down hormones the way that you want.
So it's so, so important to eat for all these organs.
I know it might seem overwhelming.
But trust me, it's so easy once you put it all together.
So I want to go into the last piece of the protocol here.
And then I'm going to open it up to some questions.
The really interesting thing that I found when I was doing
all of my research in functional medicine and
nutritional genomics and looking at all sorts of
interesting things like chronobiology, which is the
study of the circadian patterns of different organ
systems in the body, is that I thought, wow, isn't it
interesting that no one is looking at the pattern of the
menstrual cycle and mapping food on to that?
Because we can map--
For example, the adrenals really love salt in the
morning, really don't like it at night.
They like potassium at night.
So drinking a little coconut water at the end of the day
can be a way to help your adrenals release and relax
from cortisol overdose.
So there's food that maps onto our different
organ circadian patterns.
But no one was looking at that for the cycles.
So this is my big contribution is, how do we eat to be in
cyclical harmony?
Because the reality is--
And I want to break down, you have these four phases, in
case you didn't know.
Because most of us know the obvious one, the menses.
And we might know the PMS, but we don't
know what that's called.
It's called the luteal phase.
But let's go in order.
Starts with the folicular phase.
Eggs developing.
Multiple little cysts on the level of the ovary.
Then you move into the ovulatory phase.
One of the eggs leaves the ovary.
Boom Boom.
And then we're in the luteal phase.
There's two distinct parts of the luteal phase, which I'll
show you in a moment.
And then, of course, there's the menses.
Those are you four phases.
Happens to you whether you're observing them or not.
But I'd like for you to be able to start observing them
in real time.
Because most of us don't know.
How many of you know when you're ovulating?
Yeah, 2% of you.
Most of us only know when we start menstruating because we
can see it.
It's obvious.
And you need to get products.
And that's when we pay attention.
But what's really cool is, remember how I was going to
ask someone to come up and draw this chart?
Here's the chart.
Five hormones.
The hormone that I don't have present here just because we
like to layer it in after so you can see these first four
is testosterone.
You have testosterone patterns that fluctuate as well that
affect your stamina at the gym, your sexual desire,
preferences, all of that, throughout the month.
And they are absolutely mapped onto the cycle.
Let's just break down the luteal phase for a minute.
And I go into such granular detail about all the little
parts of your cycle in the book.
I cannot wait for you get your hands on it.
But in the luteal phase, you have two halves.
You have the build half, which is indicated by the rise in
the purple and the green lines on the chart from day, let's
say, 18 up to 24.
And this is both estrogen and progesterone rising.
Why?
Estrogen's thickening the lining of uterus.
Progesterone's holding it in place.
Then if there is no conception, what happens?
Both of these hormones start to drop off.
And progesterone and estrogen start to diminish.
And the lining is able to leave the body.
And that's when menstruation starts.
There are two distinct halves of this because, I want you to
pay attention to how you feel.
Most women still feel perfectly fine.
They still feel like they're in their post ovulatory glow
the first half of the luteal phase.
Their energy's good.
There's a little surge of testosterone here.
So we're feeling energized and able to do everything.
The second half of the month, depending on how far apart
estrogen and progesterone are on this chart from each other,
is the degree to which you will suffer with PMS.
So for example, if estrogen was very high and progesterone
was much lower than what you're seeing here, then
you're going to have cramps and bloating and breast
tenderness and mood swings and all of that.
And if prior to that progestorene levels are not
adequate, this is where it becomes
difficult to even get pregnant.
So if you're thinking about trying to make a baby, you
have to know where you are hormonally in each phase of
your cycle so that you can do that more successfully.
Now, here's where it gets cool.
In the book, there are several different charts that map out
for you each of these phases so that you can start to plan
your food, your exercise, your priorities, and your sex life
around where you are hormonally.
Because these distinct hormonal patterns, this is
happening to your brain.
Estrogen is flooding your brain at different
times of the month.
Progesterone, all of these things are
changing your brain chemistry.
And it makes a lot of sense that you would feel
differently week over week.
Because you know intuitively that you already do.
How many of you, for example, first half of the month you go
into a boot camp class at the gym and you crush it?
You walk out of there like, eye of
the tiger, it's awesome.
That happens.
Then same class, same you, same Lululemon pants and you
go to the same thing two weeks later, and
you're like, oh God.
Make it stop.
When is this class over?
And you're thinking to yourself,
what's wrong with me?
It's not you.
It's Where you are in your cycle.
And you're in the wrong class for that time of your cycle.
In fact, if you're dealing with adrenal issues and you
overdo it with the exercise at different times of the month,
you can actually make yourself gain weight.
How many of you have had any girlfriends who've trained for
a marathon or triathlon and they've put on 20 pounds from
doing that?
I see this all the time in my practice.
This has to do with adrenal fatigue, hormonal imbalance,
and overexercising at the wrong time of the month.
It's amazing what you can do with a lot less effort and
strain on the body if you lean into your hormonal natural
rhythms that are happening.
So I wanted to give you a taste of the priorities of how
your brain is shifting, your neurochemical shifts, so that
you might start to apply those in your work life.
Because my whole company runs on this cycle, actually.
We call it a form of body time management.
Again, it's a natural form of biotechnology that's governing
the way your body performs, so you might as well use it to
your benefit.
So during the follicular phase, this is when the brain
is getting initial doses of estrogen.
And your brain is starting to--
Think of it like popcorn of ideas.
You're like, oh, this would be interesting to do.
Or this might be an interesting way to tackle this
project that I want to get done this month.
This is a great time during your, let's say, month of
working to plan projects, to map out your chart to do,
anything that you need to do to set yourself up for success
for the month.
In the ovulatory phase, because of the flood of
estrogen on the brain, you're much more communicative and
social and magnetic at this time.
This is a great time to work in collaboration with people
in your team, to set up strategic meetings, to ask for
a raise, to go on first dates or second dates, or have
important conversations.
It would be easier for you to do it at this time.
You can do it any time of the month, of course.
But this is when you will be most--
It will feel effortless to you.
In the luteal phase, the effects of progesterone and
estrogen on the brain in conjunction have a getting
things done kind of an effect.
So I always tease women.
And I say, OK, remember how you've told yourself to do
your laundry two weeks ago and you just cannot get it done.
But then all of a sudden, something happens.
You don't register as it moving into your luteal phase.
And you just want to organize your shoe closet and your
bills and do your accounting and write thank
you letters to people.
And you're just banging things out, getting things done, this
is naturally happening to you in the luteal phase from a
neurochemical standpoint.
So lean into that.
If you have to get things done on project basis anyway at
work, why not try to leave some time in your schedule
during these weeks, these 10 days, to have project time.
Don't over schedule yourself.
Make sure you give yourself three hours a day to get
things done and crank things out.
You will feel so much more on top of your
projects if you do this.
Then during menstruation, what's happening to the brain
chemistry has you actually having the maximum amount of
communication across the corpus callosum, which is the
bundle of nerve fibers that connect the right and the left
hemisphere of the brain.
So this means you're synthesizing data from the
right and the left hemisphere in ways that you don't the
rest of the month.
So this is actually a time to do an evaluation, whether that
be evaluating people on your team, if that's your role, or
evaluating your own project performance that month, or
evaluating how you're doing in your life.
Like, how's your relationship going?
Are you really happy in your relationship?
Or are you just tolerating it?
We all do that, unfortunately.
Are you really happy with what you're doing in your job?
Are you moving forward the way that you want to?
Now, think about a bicycle versus someone walking.
Put two people on the same path.
One's on a bike.
One's walking.
Who's going to get to the finish line faster?
Bike rider, yes.
And has to do is forward vector motion of the wheels.
So imagine just doing this for one month, how much you would
get done, how far you would accomplish,
what you need to do.
Then project that out one quarter, half a
year, a whole year.
How much more progress you would make by leveraging your
hormonal patterns versus not working with them?
It is kind of like trying to turn a television on with a
remote control that only has one battery.
You wouldn't even dream of having no TV turn on.
But we try, as women, to operate not using this, not
using this technology that's available to us that is having
a real influence on our brain chemistry, our physical
sensations, our moods, our energy, our stamina.
And because we're not using it, we are inadvertently
working against it, from an endocrine system standpoint.
And it's taxing our hormonal function.
So we feel more adrenally fatigued.
Our period problems become amplified.
Women are dealing with premature ovarian failure.
They're not getting pregnant.
Their sex drive is going away in their early 30s.
Why is this?
It's not just the chemicals in the food and in the
environment.
It also has to do with how we're not
partnering with our bodies.
So, so important to think about how you can get into
cyclical harmony.
In the last section of the book, I talk all about
different-- my favorite foods.
And I just wanted to share some of the favorite foods
that you can start taking away from today to address some of
the issues that you might be dealing with.
So if you're dealing with any sort of PMS or period
problems, this would be the list that I would give you to
start with, in addition to taking on the food sequencing
that we talked about.
First thing that I could say, the most important thing is to
eliminate soy products.
I have the word reduce on the slide.
But I would highly encourage you, if you're dealing with
fibroids, endometriosis, PCOS, PMS, ovarian cysts, heavy
bleeding, to eliminate soy.
Soy has high concentrations of estrogen, especially if it's
not organic GMO Free soy.
There was a study done in Brazil on GMO soy and its
effects on both male and female rats'
reproductive system.
Poor rats, they had to eat all that soy.
And what they found was actually that the GMO soy
changed the uterine structure in the female rats, changed
the shape of the uterus in the females.
And what's really exciting about what's going on with the
whole genomic research and food, we actually now can look
in a laboratory setting at your biome, your human genome,
plant genomes, the food you're eating, and the intestinal
microbiome that you have and how they're
interacting with eachother.
They're changing each other.
These genes--
The vegetable that you ate has genetic material.
It's mixing with yours.
And the bacteria that you have in your gut is mixing with
your genes.
So you need to learn how to partner with that whole
process, otherwise it's going to run your life.
Definitely want to get you more on kale.
Kale, cabbage, brussel sprouts, broccoli, these
cruciferous vegetables contain substances that help the body
break down estrogen.
They also are rich in magnesium and calcium, which
helps during the PMS phase, if you're struggling with that.
And then, of course, this is one of my favorite juices for
women who are having cycle issues.
And it's just a good cover for blood building, for liver
detoxification, and for circulation.
So you can get this recipe and try it at home.
Make your own juice.
It's really, really great.
Let's say you are thinking about having a child at some
point in the future.
And you'd like to preserve your fertility, make sure your
egg quality is good, make sure ovulation is strong.
These are some things that you can try.
Turmeric has been shown to improve the vascular
health of the ovary.
Cinammon actually reduces insulin levels, which help
keep ovulation healthy.
Avocado, one of the studies I cite in the book, avocado
should be a poster on every IVF doctor's office.
Because we now know, lab tested, women who go through
IVF and eat three avocados a week versus women who don't
eat any avocados have a 3 and 1/2 greater successful outcome
with IVF than the women who were not increasing levels of
essential fatty acids.
Why?
Hormones are all stabilized in fat.
And women on our no fat, low fat diets are doing ourselves
a huge disservice for hormonal health and long term fertility
optimization by not eating good sources of fat.
So each your avocadoes.
In terms of energy and sex drive, a lot of this has to do
with your adrenal health.
So there are a couple of things I would have you do
immediately.
Get off the caffeine, because we know it over stimulates the
adrenal, not even, green tea, not even decaf, nothing, for a
couple months.
By the way, the whole protocol takes three months to do.
So don't think this has to be a forever thing.
But if you want to get your body kick started to healing,
give your body a break.
And the summertime is very easy to go off caffeine
because it's hot.
You'll want colder things anyway, so try it now.
Get on a B vitamin.
A B100 complex will contain adequate levels of B12, B6,
and B5, which the adrenal glands need to perform.
And I would say if you're really struggling with adrenal
fatigue, and some of the things I talked about with
weight and energy levels resounded with you, I would
definitely exercise no more than 20 minutes at
a time at the gym.
After that, you're burning your adrenal reserve.
And you're causing more spikes in cortisol.
And you're making the problem worse.
So this will, of course, continue to keep you in that
vicious cycle of low energy.
And when there's no energy, there is no
reserve for sex drive.
So if you want to bring sexy back, it's not Justin
Timberlake.
It's B vitamins.
Although, he's so cute.
Connect with us.
We are a whole community of women who are living in the
WomanCode way.
We are all in flow with our hormonal health.
Find us on Facebook.
There's a weekly video series that we
have that's me talking.
So if you enjoyed me talking, you'll see more of me.
And they're all under five minutes.
And it's really about how can you be troubleshooting in real
time all the issues that you're dealing with?
And connect with us.
I want to hear how you're doing.
So I want to open it up to you, little ovary town hall.
What are some questions that you have?
What are some things that you heard that you have some
deeper dive desires around?
And how can I support your cycle, your
fertility, your sex drive?
Lay it on me girls.
Yes.
AUDIENCE: So you mentioned with the different parts of
your cycle that there are things that you should focus
on more, because [INAUDIBLE]
when your cycles are.
What would say if you had to schedule yourself with some
kind of medical procedure or surgery or something?
Where in your cycle would you have to do that?
ALISA VITTI: Depends on the procedure.
But ideally around the ovulation time, where you have
a little bit extra testosterone.
So a little bit more stamina and energy to
bounce back more quickly.
And also because as you lead up to menstruation--
How many of you have ever gone to the dentist right before
your period and notice that your gums bleed a lot more?
You have more of that potential for happening.
So you have more bleeding happening, less coagulation,
leading up to that.
So I would schedule it more towards the first half of the
month if you can.
Great question.
Yes?
AUDIENCE: So I've heard two things.
The one, that cortisol, it increases that.
It makes that deposit.
But it seems like in this case, it actually signals the
burning of fat.
And I also heard that caffeine helps stimulate metabolism.
And both of those things seem like they conflict?
ALISA VITTI: Yes.
AUDIENCE: So what are your thoughts on that?
ALISA VITTI: It brings up an important point.
Every magazine you read every month, isn't it annoying?
There's like do this.
Now, do this.
And by the way, we're just saying do the opposite of what
we said last month.
So this is some of the things that this makes me feel
reminded of.
But when we're talking about a woman who's struggling with
menstrual issues, fertility issues, low energy, low libido
issues, adrenal fatigue is happening.
Period pun intended.
So we know that for woman who has got these issues that
caffeine is going to have an adverse effect on her.
It's not going to stimulate her metabolism.
In fact, how it works on the blood sugar level is cortisol
is going to get the fat out from the fat stores into the
bloodstream.
But then the pancreas is going to be hyper responsive,
secrete lots of insulin to try to restore it.
So that's how indirectly you end up with more fatty
deposits, because you have too much cortisol being produced.
So again, because caffeine is triggering that for women who
are adrenally fatigued and who are struggling with these
issues, it causes a vicious cycle from an endocrine
function standpoint.
Now, for some people who, let's say, are in their
perimenopausal years, post menopausal years, caffeine can
be a beneficial tool.
But for a lot of women who are in their reproductive years, I
don't find this to be great advice.
And unfortunately, a lot of--
And I was on the "Dr. Oz" show and all of this.
A lot of these shows are being watched by women
who are over 50.
And so a lot of the topics are being geared towards that
demographic, which is great.
They need support too.
But I'm really interested in women who are still in their
reproductive years.
Because what you do in your 20s and 30s will completely
dictate your hormonal destiny, your whole entire health
destiny in your 40s, 50s, and 60s and beyond.
So I want to take your period seriously for sure.
More questions.
Great question.
You had a question.
AUDIENCE: Yeah.
Well, one of them you answered, because I was going
to ask you about selenium.
ALISA VITTI: Good.
AUDIENCE: The other one was about what we put on our skin.
ALISA VITTI: Yes.
AUDIENCE: So spray tans, those are all chemicals.
ALISA VITTI: Oh.
AUDIENCE: Right?
ALISA VITTI: Great question.
No one has asked me that question before.
AUDIENCE: I'm trying to stay out of the sun and
be good to my skin.
I wear SPF 50 on my face every day now.
ALISA VITTI: Great.
AUDIENCE: But I don't like looking pale in the summer.
So I've been doing the occasional spray tan here and
there, even thought I know that's probably great either.
ALISA VITTI: Yeah.
Here would be my recommendation.
If you really are limiting it to two months out of the year,
I would say that's OK.
I personally would never put that chemical on my skin, any
kind of self tanner--
AUDIENCE: OK.
It's a self tanning lotion.
ALISA VITTI: Just because it affects melatonin.
That's how it works.
And melatonin's a really powerful hormone.
In fact, it's so powerful that you cannot get it without a
prescription outside of this country.
In Europe, if you want to take melatonin to help you with
your sleep, you have to have a doctor write you a
prescription for it.
Here, we just go buy it.
And we take massive doses of this.
That's a whole other conversation.
But I would not use that.
However, if you are going to use it, and that's a personal
choice, again, I'm only asking you to be good on protocol 80%
of the time.
Because if you have an environment where 80% of the
time you're strengthening your endocrine response, the 20% of
your life where you make choices like you're going to
have a night of drinking, you're going to have the spray
tan, you're going to have whatever food on vacation
you're going to have, your body can
bounce back from that.
Any ratio different than that, like 70%, 60% on, your body
can't respond as quickly.
And you start to get into symptoms much, much faster.
So make choices.
If you're rest of you is hormonally golden, fabulous,
you're humming along and everything's great, then two
months of--
I would rather you do the self tanner, just because I would
rather you not risk the aerosol exposure of the whole
way that that's delivered.
You're breathing it in.
It's a whole other thing.
I would rather you do spray tan.
AUDIENCE: You would rather, which one?
ALISA VITTI: I'm sorry.
Self tanner cream, than the spray tan.
And I would also rather you do it small amounts of the year.
AUDIENCE: OK.
And then what about--
I've heard that there's organic spray tan out there.
Have you heard of it?
ALISA VITTI: I haven't heard of it.
But I would check out self tanners at Whole Foods.
I haven't looked, because I prefer to glow in the dark.
And I don't tan at all.
But check it out and see.
Certainly, the organic self tanners are going to have the
surrounding cocktail, the recipe, the lotion is not
going to have parabens and petrolatum and other chemicals
that are known endocrine disrupters.
So if it does exist, 100,000%, do that.
Yeah.
Great question.
Yes.
AUDIENCE: A lot of what you talked about assumes that
you're not regulating your cycle with birth control
pills, right?
So you mention00
ALISA VITTI: Not true, but go ahead.
Keep going.
AUDIENCE: Oh.
My question is, what if you're on the pill?
And you touched upon in the beginning about
going off the pill.
I'm curious what your thougts are.
ALISA VITTI: Yes.
Lots of conversation. about the pill in the book.
And I can go on and on and on.
But essentially, you're still having hormonal cycles if
you're on the pill.
If you're having symptoms, and many women do still have
symptoms of hormonal issues on the pill, and if you have
adrenal fatigue, and if you're constipated, and you're having
other things going on, and you're on the pill, the best
thing for you to do is to start getting on the protocol.
Because if you then identify or if you now realize that you
have an underlying hormonal imbalance for which you
decided to take the pill.
And the pill for these issues that we're talking about,
think of it like putting masking tape over the
indicator light on your car.
It's blinking at you to try to get you to pay attention.
Change the oil, something's wrong, refill at the next
station, something like that.
And being on the pill prevents you from really paying
attention in real time.
But if over time, the symptoms start building and it's
undeniable that you have some hormonal stuff that needs
addressed, get on protocol.
And then you can work with your doctor.
We have so many women who do this, who then end up taking a
little birth control pill vacation.
You do the protocol for three months.
Then you take three months off the pill and reassess, how is
your hormonal performance?
Are you now healthy and hormonally balanced?
If so, your choice.
Go back on the pill, no problem.
If you get off the pill and you're still struggling with
symptoms, there's more work for you to do nutritionally,
maybe another month or two.
But it is so essential in your 20s and 30s to resolve those
issues now.
Because what I don't want to see is what I see often, far
too often at my center.
Women who've been on the pill for 15, 20 years with hormonal
imbalances from their teens and early 20s, fibroids, endo,
cramps, whatever, PCOS, even PMS.
And then they find their partner.
They want to have a baby.
They're pushing 40.
And now, all of a sudden, you go off the pill.
And you have a reduced amount of time to
correct these issues.
And your stress levels are high because you feel the
pressure of all that.
So don't do that to yourself, meaning you now have some
important information that I know isn't being discussed on
a regular basis unless I'm here.
And I'm happy to be here.
But share it with your girlfriends.
Hand them a copy of the book.
Let them know, hey, this is really, really important that
you understand and appreciate what your period is actually
telling you now about your fertility in the future.
Yes.
AUDIENCE: So going back, instead of having coffee and
the bagel in the morning--
ALISA VITTI: Is this what you have for breakfast?
AUDIENCE: No.
Actually, I was eating dinner foods for breakfast.
ALISA VITTI: Dinner foods for breakfast are ideal.
AUDIENCE: Yeah, I was eating salty stuff or
leftovers from dinner.
So what do you recommend eating then first thing in the
morning to set yourself off right?
ALISA VITTI: Depends on your body's metabolism.
That's why step one of our process on the online platform
is metabolic testing, so that you know exactly what your
body needs, carbohydrates, fats, proteins, sugar in the
morning, salt.
And you know what works for you and what doesn't work.
We also teach you how to track which foods are working for
you best and which are not.
So we do all sorts of fun food experiments.
But ideally, and it changes week over week where you are
in the cycle.
And I lay this all out for you how you can start your own
experiment on your own at home, based on where you are
in your cycle, what kinds of breakfasts, lunches, and
dinners you would have,
hormonally optimizing yourself.
More questions.
I'll take two more before we wrap.
You have a question.
You've been looking at me soulfully all day.
Tell me.
AUDIENCE: I'm curious to know what you use on your skin.
ALISA VITTI: Yes.
I just did a vlog about is talking about
clearing up the skin.
And we got, I don't know, a zillion comments about, oh my
god, what products do you use.
I didn't realize my skin was that gorgeous.
Thank you.
And having been a former acne sufferer, it's valuable to
just continuously get that feedback.
Because when you've had acne, you're never quite sure if
your skin looks good anymore.
But now, after so many years, I think I'm getting the memo,
All I use on my skin, for real, I use two things.
I use an alpha hydroxy acid twice a week at night.
I use something by Earth Science.
It's called AB glycolic or hydroxy or
something like that.
I buy it at Whole Foods.
Very gentle.
Twice a week, that's it.
I just wash my face at night.
Other than that, I don't put anything else on it.
Maybe sometimes a little witch hazel in the summer if I feel
particularly oily.
I am Mediterranean, so I self lubricate.
And then for moisturizer, the only thing that I use is pure
aloe vera gel, which you buy in the sun care section at
Whole Foods.
It's a little tube.
I buy two a year.
They each cost $4.00.
That's it.
Aloe vera gel is amazing.
IT's anti-inflammatory.
It's antiwrinkle.
It's natural cell turnover.
And it's fantastic, shrinks the pores.
You don't need to get sucked into--
Once you know how food works in the body, all the marketing
about lotions and potions, you kind of look at it like,
that's not true.
None of that's actually true, what you're saying.
The simpler, the more direct the ingredient, the better.
AUDIENCE: Makeup remover.
ALISA VITTI: Makeup remover.
What am I using?
Oh yes, I think it's another Earth Science, natural, like a
lotion, very gentle.
Makeup, I use mineral makeup at Whole Foods or Aveda
mineral makeup.
I use natural mascara.
I think the brand is called Gabriel, things like that.
Jane Iredale makeup, amazing.
Lots of great organic make up now.
And there's a great website you can go to check that out,
Green Beauty, I think it's called.
AUDIENCE: Is Bare Minerals actually minerals?
It's actually good for your skin.
You can sleep in it and all that stuff.
ALISA VITTI: Bare Minerals has some chemicals in it that are
endocrine disruptive.
So that's why you should check the ingredients.
You want mineral make up that is without
all of those chemicals.
So that's why some of the ones at Whole Foods are better.
I think one is called Mineral Fusion.
Yeah.
You use that one?
AUDIENCE: I've used it before.
ALISA VITTI: Yeah.
It's good.
It's really good.
AUDIENCE: What about sunscreen?
ALISA VITTI: I use Alba Botanical sun screen.
This is so much fun.
I am a product lover.
So I should do a whole thing on products.
Alba Botanical, I use their SPF 50 face.
And then they have a really yummy enzyme pineapple.
So while your sun tanning, you're also exfoliating dead
skin, which builds up in copious quantities while
you're exposing yourself to the sun.
AUDIENCE: Do you wear that every day.
ALISA VITTI: I don't wear sunscreen every day,
personally.
And I don't spend a lot of time out in the sun.
And if I do, if I know I'm going to be in the sun a lot,
I either wear a hat.
Or I do put some sunscreen on my face.
But I try not to do it.
But I think that's been a good thing.
Because people on this book tour have been like, how old
are you again?
And certainly, it's a combination of, obviously,
what I'm eating and my hormonal health, but also how
we take care of our skin.
AUDIENCE: What about insect repellents?
ALISA VITTI: Oh my god, don't use it.
No, no, no.
AUDIENCE: I kind of can't live without it.
ALISA VITTI: No.
Yes you can.
All you need to do is take 200 milligrams of vitamin B1.
Changes the scent of your skin.
Mosquitoes won't even know you're there.
AUDIENCE: B1 or D1?
ALISA VITTI: B. B as in boy.
B1.
AUDIENCE: Take it every day?
ALISA VITTI: No, just take it an hour or two before you're
going to go out outside where the mosquitoes are going to
eat you alive.
AUDIENCE: Take how much?
ALISA VITTI: 200.
AUDIENCE: And so if I'm travelling somewhere,--
ALISA VITTI: B vitamins.
AUDIENCE: --just take it once a day?
ALISA VITTI: No, take it before you're going to be out
where you're exposed a lot.
So typically, mosquitoes are not out all day long.
They're only out at night when it starts to get cooler.
Just pay attention to where your trouble zones are and try
it around there.
The stuff in bug spray is endocrine disruptive on a
major, major scale.
So you don't want to be spraying that on yourself or
on children.
Don't spray it on your kids.
One last question, then we're going to wrap.
Yes.
AUDIENCE: So related to the B supplements.
I kind of get this feeling sometimes that we weren't
designed to have to take supplements.
ALISA VITTI: You're right.
AUDIENCE: So, with things like the B vitamins, what kind of
foods can we get those quantities of B vitamins?
ALISA VITTI: Complex carbohydrates.
Complex carbohydrates, eggs, and animal protein contain
massive quantities of B vitamins.
And so again, if you're someone who is-- and we didn't
talk about all the fad diets that are out there, vegan,
paleo, fresh airaterian, whatever you're doing, I am
not dogmatic about food.
To me, it's not so much about the trend or a theory.
I'm only interested in what is the actual response that this
food is creating in the body.
And then I want to put that food in based on if my body
needs that.
So for example, if you're struggling to have cycles at
all and you're vegan, it might be really great if you were to
introduce organic pasture fed egg yolks into your diet.
Why?
They boost levels of progesterone in the body,
which you might need to get your cycle back on track.
And other B vitamins do other things.
And I can go on and on.
But you have to be willing to eat everything in the right
quantity for you.
And for women especially, I can't drive the healthy fats
idea home enough.
And eating more fat will actually, if you're dealing
with all these hormonal problems, help you lose weight
faster, for sure.
I'm so glad to have met you.
I'm happy to sign some books now.
And I would love to stay connected to you.
We have free resources for you.
In fact, as a special thank you for those who chose not to
shop today and to come to this, I would love to give to
all of you a free 30 minute consult with
one of our Flo coaches.
So if there's any further questions that you have, you
can certainly get those answered.
And I'll just need is your email address.
And we'll get you set up.
Thank you so much for listening,
for your great questions.